To give your life more harmony. You liv'd there Not where you dwelt. I would not prophesy, What may succeed your change. Lady B. You do imagine, No doubt, you have talk'd wisely, and confuted [Enter Sir Thomas Bornwell. Bornwell. How now? What's the matter? Born. Angry, sweetheart? Lady B. I am angry with myself, To be so miserably restrain'd in things, Wherein it doth concern your love and honour Born. In what, Aretina, Dost thou accuse me? Have I not obey'd Born. I am not ignorant how much nobility All the best ornaments which become my fortune; But would not flatter it, to ruin both, And be the fable of the town, to teach To serve your vast expenses. Lady B. Am I then Brought in the balance? So, sir! Born. Though you weigh Me in a partial scale, my heart is honest, Nay, study ways of pride and costly ceremony: Lady B. Have you done, sir? Born. I could accuse the gaiety of your wardrobe, And prodigal embroideries, under which Not shew their own complexions; your jewels, Able to burn out the spectators' eyes, Lady B. Pray do, I like Your homily of thrift. Born. I could wish, madam, You would not game so much. Lady B. A gamester too! Born. But are not come to that acquaintance yet, Should teach you skill enough to raise your profit. You look not through the subtilty of cards, And mysteries of dice; nor can you save Charge with the box, buy petticoats and pearls, And keep your family by the precious income; Nor do I wish you should: my poorest servant Shall not upbraid my tables, nor his hire, Purchas'd beneath my honour. You make play Not a pastime but a tyranny, and vex Yourself and my estate by it. Lady B. Good! proceed. Born. Another game you have, which consumes more Some darks had been discover'd, and the deeds too: Lady B. Have you concluded Born. I have done; and howsoever My language may appear to you, it carries To your delights, without curb to their modest Sellinger's Round was a dance called after an actor named S Leger. To throw is here said of cock-throwing, an old Shrovetide pastime-the prize in this case being candlesticks. Robin Hood Maid Marian, the hobby-horse, and the fool, all in more or les fantastic costumes, were the principal performers in the Old English May-day Morris-dances. In The Ball, a comedy partly by Chapman, but chiefly by Shirley, a coxcomb (Bostock), crazed on the point of family, is admirably shown up. Sir Marmaduke Travers, by way of fooling him, tells him that he is rivalled in his suit of a particular lady by Sir Ambrose Lamount: Bostock. Does she love any body else? But she has half a score, upon my knowledge, Are suitors for her favour. Bos. Name but one, And if he cannot shew as many coats Trav. He thinks he has good cards for her, and likes His game well. Bos. Be an understanding knight, And take my meaning; if he cannot shew As much in heraldry Trav. I do not know how rich he is in fields, But he is a gentleman. Bos. Is he a branch of the nobility? How many lords can he call cousin? else He must be taught to know he has presumed, To stand in competition with me. Trav. You will not kill him? I have that within me must not be provok'd; Trav. Some living that have been kill'd! Bes. I mean, some living that have been examples, Not to confront nobility; and I Am sensible of my honour. Trav. His name is Sir Ambrose Thou 'rt a brave knight, and I commend thy judgment. Lam. Sir Marmaduke himself leans that way too. Bos. Why did'st conceal it? come, the more the merrier; But I could never see you there. Trav. I hope, Sir, we may live? Bos. I'll tell you, gentlemen, Cupid has given us all one livery; I serve that lady too, you understand me, But who shall carry her, the Fates determine; Lam. That would be no addition to your blood. Trav. You did But jest before. Lam. 'Twere pity that one drop Of your heroic blood should fall to the ground: Who knows but all your cousin lords may die? The following lyric is found in Shirley's masque, The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses (1659). It is said to have been greatly admired by Charles II. : Death's Final Conquest. The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things; Scepter and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made They stoop to fate, And must give up their murmuring breath, When they, pale captives, creep to death. The garlands wither on your brow, Then boast no more your mighty deeds; Upon Death's purple altar now, See, where the victor-victim bleeds: To the cold tomb, Only the actions of the just Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. Shirley's Dramatic Works were edited by Gifford and Dyce (6 vols. 1833); and there is a selection of five plays and one masque, with a prefatory memoir by the present writer (1888). EDMUND GOSSE. Minor Dramatists. -Thomas Nabbes (died about 1645) wrote poor tragedies, tolerable comedies, and rather good masques. Microcosmus and Spring's Glory are the best-known masques. Some of his miscellaneous poems are good. Mr Bullen published his works (except his prose continuation of Knolles's Historie of the Turkes) in his Old English Plays (1887). — Nathaniel Field (15871633) was a well-known actor who began to write for the stage about 1610, and produced A Woman is a Weathercock, Amends for Ladies, &c. He had the honour of being associated with Massinger in the composition of the Fatal Dowry.-Henry Glapthorne, at one time reputed 'one of the chiefest dramatic poets of the reign of Charles I.,’ is but a minor dramatist though he is fluent and eloquent in style. Five of his plays are printed -Albertus Wallenstein, The Hollander, Argalus and Parthenia (his best effort, being part of the Arcadia dramatised), Wit is a Constable, The Lady's Priviledge. These and his poems were reprinted in two volumes in 1874.—Richard Brome (died about 1652) produced twenty-four popular plays, The Northern Lass, The Jovial Crew, The Antipodes, The City Wit, The Court Beggar, &c., fifteen of which, believed to be written by himself independently, were reprinted in three vols. 1873. He had a share with Dekker in The Lancashire Witches. He was at one time servant to Ben Jonson. A skilful and successful craftsman, he had neither original power, poetic genius, nor literary culture. Richard Brathwaite, minor poet, was probably born near Kendal in 1588; entered Oriel College, Oxford, in 1604; passed afterwards to Cambridge, and thence to London. In 1611 he published The Golden Fleece, a collection of poems; in 1614 three works, one of them a book of pastorals entitled The Poet's Willow, another The Scholler's Medley; and in 1615 the collection of satires, A Strappado for the Devil, in imitation of The Abuses Whipt and Stript of George Wither, his 'bonnie brother.' Other works are Nature's Embassie, A Solemne Joviall Disputation, The Smoaking Age, The English Gentleman (1630), The English Gentlewoman (1631), Art asleepe, Husband? (a collection of 'bolster lectures,' a seventeenth-century Mrs Caudle). After his first marriage Brathwaite lived the life of a country gentleman in Westmorland, and after his second in Yorkshire. He died near Richmond, 4th May 1673. Of his thirty books, the Barnaba Itinerarium, or Barnabee's Journal, published in 1638 under the pseudonym 'Corymbæus,' has been often reprinted under the title of 'Drunken Barnaby's Four Journeys'-a facetious but rather aimless and tedious book in rhymed Latin and corresponding doggerel English verse. The best-known verse is : In my progress travelling northward The Latin being: In progressu boreali Ut processi ab australi, Veni Banbury, O profanum! Ubi vidi Puritanum Felem facientem furem, Quod Sabbatho stravit murem. The next verse is : To Oxford came I, whose companion From whose seat do stream most seemly Each thing there's the muse's minion, The horn at Queen's speaks pure Athenian. The frequent allusions to strong ale, and to deep drinking and its joys and inconveniences, quite explain the epithet added in the reprints. In the seventh edition (by Haslewood, 1818) its authorship was first made known. See the life prefixed to the ninth edition (1820). An eleventh edition appeared in 1876. Brathwaite's work was not all in the same vein. Of 'Drunken Barnaby' there is no trace in The English Gentleman and English Gentlewoman, collectively making a folio of three hundred pages, which is edifying, decorous, and ‘high-toned' to a degree, and emulates Burton's Anatomy in the multitude and variety of its citations from Eusebius, Tully, Diogenes Laertius, Plutarch, Augustine, Seneca, St Basil, St Gregory of Nazianzus, Picus de Mirandula, and other authorities ancient or comparatively recent. Vanity, foppery, idleness, hot-headedness, and intemperance of any and every kind are wisely and wittily denounced. The corresponding defects in women are deprecated with equal warmth, and an even higher standard of perfect grace, courtesy, and purity established. And so careful is the author for happiness in wedded life that he warns the husband not to busy himself too much in dairying lest the wife be aggrieved at this encroachment on her province. Amorous poetryincluding Venus and Adonis, though without giving Shakespeare's name-is sternly denounced. In the chapter called 'A select choice and recommendation of sundry bookes of instruction to the perusall of our English gentlewomen,' the authors recommended are SS. Hierom, Augustine, Ambrose, Hilary, Gregory (on the virtues of women), also Plato, Seneca, Cicero, etc.'; with the following postscript, which most unhappily omits to specify the works without which the library of no contemporary English lady was complete : But for as much as it is not given to most of you to bee Linguists, albeit many of their workes bee translated in your mother tongue, you may converse with sundry English Authors, whose excellent instructions will suffciently store you in all points, and if usefully applied conferre no small benefit to your understanding. I shall not need particularly to name them to you, because I doubt not but you have made choice of such faithfull Reteiners and vertuous Bosome-friends constantly to accompany you. Hear 'Drunken Barnaby' on the dangers and disgraces of drinking : Neither onely is restraint to be used in the choice and change of meats, but in the excessive use of drinkes. The reasons are two; the one is, it is an enemy to the knowledge of God; the other is this, it is held to be an enfeebler or impairer of the memorative parts; for you shall ever note that deepe drinkers have but shallow memories. Their common saying is, Let us drowne care in healths: which drowning of care makes them so forgetfull of themselves, as carried away with a brutish appetite, they onely intend their present delight, without reflexion to what is past, or due preparation to what may succeed. O restraine then this mighty assailant of Temperance! Bee ever your selves; but principally stand upon your guard, when occasion of company shall induce you; being the last we are to speake of. This Company-keeping, how much it hath depraved the hopefullest and towardliest wits, daily experience can witnesse. For many wee see civilly affected and temper ately disposed, of themselves not subject to those violent or brain-sicke passions which the fumes of drinke beget; till out of a too pliable disposition they enter the lists of Good-fellowship (as they commonly terme it) and so become estranged from their owne nature, to partake with Zanies in their distempered humour. So as in time by consorting with evill men they become exposed to all immoderate affections; such is the strength of custome. Whence it is that Saint Basil saith, Passions rise up in a drunken man (note the violence of this distemper) like a swarme of Bees buzzing on every side. Now you shall see him compassionately passionate, resolving his humour into teares; anon like a phrenticke man, exercising himselfe in blowes; presently, as if a calmer or more peaceable humour had seized on him, he expresseth his loving nature in congies and kisses. So different are the affections which this valiant Maultworme is subject to; yet howsoever out of a desperate Bravado he binde it with oathes that he will stand to his tackling, he is scarce to be credited, for he can stand on no ground. William Browne (1591-c. 1643) was a pastoral and descriptive poet, who, like Phineas and Giles Fletcher, adopted Spenser for his model, but less exclusively for he loved Chaucer and Hoccleve, and was influenced by several of his own contemporaries. He was a native of Tavistock, and the beautiful scenery of Devonshire inspired his early strains. From Exeter College, Oxford, Browne passed to the Inner Temple, and then was tutor to Robert Dormer, the future Earl of Carnarvon. According to Anthony Wood, he was taken into the household of the Herberts at Wilton, and there got wealth and purchased an estate.' He was living at Dorking towards the close of 1643, and later than this we hear nothing of him. A William Browne died at Tavistock in 1643, and another in 1645, but it is not known for certain that either of them was the poet. Browne's works comprise Britannia's Pastorals (two books, 1613-16; third book in MS., first printed 1852) and a pastoral poem of inferior merit, The Shepheards Pipe (1614). In 1620 a masque by him was produced at court, called The Inner Temple Masque; but it was not printed till 1772, from a script in Emmanuel College, Cambridge. As all Browne's poems were produced before he was thirty years of age, and the best when he was little more than twenty, we need not be surprised at their showing marks of juvenility and frequent echoes of previous poets, especially of Spenser. His pastorals obtained the approbation of Selden, Drayton, Wither, and Ben Jonson. Britannia's Pastorals are written in flowing heroic couplets, and contain much fine descriptive poetry. Browne had great facility of expression, studied nature closely, and knew by heart all the features of the Devon landscape. That he has failed in maintaining his ground must be attributed to his too great expansiveness, the desultory plan of his longer poems, and the lack of human interest. His shepherds and shepherdesses have nearly as little character as the 'silly sheep' they tend; the allegory is tedious; whilst pure description, that 'takes the place of sense,' even when inspired by a real love of nature, manu seldom permanently interests the larger number of readers. So completely had some of the poems of Browne vanished from memory that, but for a single copy of them possessed by Thomas Warton, and lent by him to be transcribed, little would have remained of those works which their author fondly hoped would Keep his name enroll'd past his that shines In gilded marble, or in brazen leaves. Warton cites the following lines of Browne as containing a group of the same images as the morning picture in L'Allegro of Milton: By this had chanticleer, the village clock, Browne celebrated the death of a friend under the name of Philarete in a pastoral poem. Milton took thence suggestions for Lycidas; there is an obvious-perhaps inevitable-similarity in some of the thoughts and images. On the other hand, Browne has been compared with Keats amongst the moderns; and Keats is known to have admired his Elizabethan prototype. A Descriptive Sketch. O what a rapture have I gotten now! Have drawn me from my song! I onward run So please the smelling sense, that you are fain You spy at end thereof a standing lake, And makes you think none blest but who live there. Now pleasing one, and then another sense. Evening. As in an evening when the gentle air I oft have sat on Thames' sweet bank to hear The sable mantle of the silent night The Sirens' Song. (From The Inner Temple Masque.) Steer hither, steer, your winged pines, All beaten mariners, Here lie Love's undiscover'd mines, Perfumes far sweeter than the best Fear not your ships, Nor any to oppose you save our lips, But come on shore, Where no joy dies till love hath gotten more. For swelling waves our panting breasts, vile The compass love shall hourly sing, And as he goes about the ring, We will not miss To tell each point he nameth with a kiss. Browne thus ingeniously draws illustrations from a rose: Look as a sweet rose fairly budding forth Bewrays her beauties to th' enamour'd morn, Until some keen blast from the envious North Kills the sweet bud that was but newly born; Or else her rarest smells delighting Make her herself, betray, Some white and curious hand inviting To pluck her thence away. So recently as 1852 a third part of Britannia's Pastorals was first printed, from the original manuscript in the library of Salisbury Cathedral. Though imperfect, this continuation is in some passages fully equal to the earlier portions. The following is part of a description of Psyche : Her cheekes the wonder of what eye beheld In gentle rising plaines devinely swelled, Yet shewd her selfe imperfect in the close, . On her sweet words all eares and hearts attended; When that she sung, they thought the planetts seaven By her sweet voice might well their tunes have mended; When she did sighe, all were of joye bereaven: And when she smyld, heaven had them all befriended. Her slender fingers (neate and worthy made O happy braceletts! but more happy he To whom those armes shall as a bracelett be! Aubrey said Browne was the author of the famous epitaph, 'Underneath this sable herse, usually attributed to Ben Jonson (see above at page 411); and Mr Bullen and other critics think it is really Browne's. Browne's works were edited in 1772 (3 vols. 12mo) by Themas Davies; a complete edition, with a memoir, was published by W. C. Hazlitt (2 vols. Roxburghe Club, 1868). Lady Elizabeth Carey, or CAREW, the daughter of a patroness of Spenser, Nash, and other poets, is believed to be the author of a longwinded poem, The Tragedie of Marian the faire Queene of Jewry (1613). She married Sir Thomas Berkeley, and died in 1635. But the poem is sometimes attributed to her mother, known by the same names, a daughter of Sir John Spencer |